ABSTRACT
Within cognitive psychology there has been much debate in recent years on what processes at the semantic level underlie word comprehension and the identification of objects (see e.g., Glucksberg, 1984; Snodgrass, 1984; Te Linde, 1982). This paper will be concerned with the types of disorder that arise from impairments of these processes and the light they can throw on our understanding of normal function. A standard assumption is that to access a semantic representation requires the prior attaining of some form of pre-semantic representation of the input, such as the identification of a word-form or logogen in the perception of words or perceptual classification—the accessing of a “pictogen”—in the recognition of objects (see e.g., Morton, 1970 for words; Warrington & Taylor, 1978 for objects; Seymour, 1979 for review). The present discussion will be concerned with the processes that follow the attainment of these pre-semantic types of representation.
